How many generals in an army?

[orangat]

The general with the most stars lead the army can other generals in the same army earn stars and good traits as well? Basically I want to make sure all my generals get to stretch their legs once in a while.

Are good traits dependent upon the performance of the individual units led by gens or the final battle stats? Does it differ from the commanding and supporting generals?

There was an odd child who popped up with military genius 4 star skills but also had cowardly (-5% morale), hooting (wtf?) and advanced alopecia. How bad is -5% morale and hooting? Does 4 star skills overwhelmingly supercede the deficiencies?

[x-dANGEr]

The general with the most stars lead the army can other generals in the same army earn stars and good traits as well?
I don't think so. Only the leading general earns something out of battles.

Are good traits dependent upon the performance of the individual units led by gens or the final battle stats?
Final Battle Stats AFAIK.

There was an odd child who popped up with military genius 4 star skills but also had cowardly (-5% morale), hooting (wtf?) and advanced alopecia. How bad is -5% morale and hooting? Does 4 star skills overwhelmingly supercede the deficiencies?
I don't think he's worth it no.. -5 morale is really bad, unless he gets/has other traits/retinues that gives morale so it compisinate this negative effect.


Level Craven_Coward
Description Craven_Coward_desc
EffectsDescription Craven_Coward_effects_desc
Epithet Craven_Coward_epithet_desc
Threshold 6

Effect TroopMorale -3
Effect PopularStanding -15
As you can see through that, coward's effect is only -3 morale and -15 popular standing (For Romans).

[shadowarmy75]

I would think morale penalties are most important as it affects all units, while stars just affect units around your general.

[Ludens]

Are good traits dependent upon the performance of the individual units led by gens or the final battle stats? Does it differ from the commanding and supporting generals?
Not entirely. A general who's unit doesn't fight or routs can get cowardly-vices. Killing a couple of enemies (even routing peasants will do) with the general's unit prevents this. General's who lose many hitpoints become scarred or get a heroic saviour ancillary. I am not quite sure about this, but I think this only applies to the commanding general.


There was an odd child who popped up with military genius 4 star skills but also had cowardly (-5% morale), hooting (wtf?) and advanced alopecia. How bad is -5% morale and hooting? Does 4 star skills overwhelmingly supercede the deficiencies?
-5 Morale is very bad and hooting means that his sanity is very questionable, which is not quite as bad, but still. Even if he has four command stars, his cowardism makes his soldiers very likely to run if things do not go entirely your way. I suggest you send him out on his own or with a small, dependable army to kill a few low-level enemies. Make sure his unit kills a lot during these battles: you need to buff up his image. Despite his oddities, he can make a capable general provided you get rid of his cowardism.


I would think morale penalties are most important as it affects all units, while stars just affect units around your general.
Morale penalties are important, but stars do affect all units on the battlefield. Only the morale bonus derived from the general's command ability is limited to a small area around the general.

[orangat]

It was a doubtful courage rating which is -1 (not -5) morale and -5% popularity.
I managed to erase his bad trait in one battle where I threw him at everything.

My question now is - Would he still be a carrier of cowardliness?
The problem is that its still very early in the game and if I keep the bum around, his bad traits might be passed on. Better to let him freeze his ass building forts in the winter.

Gaining bad traits by not fighting very irritating since throwing depleted generals bodyguards into battles is risky. How the hell do you develop them when you can't attach them to infantry units because you don't want them killed so easily.

[Ludens]

My question now is - Would he still be a carrier of cowardliness?
No.


Gaining bad traits by not fighting very irritating since throwing depleted generals bodyguards into battles is risky. How the hell do you develop them when you can't attach them to infantry units because you don't want them killed so easily.
Killing a few routers should suffice in proving your general's valour. Also, it doesn't matter if you don't do it in every battle.

[orangat]

No.


Killing a few routers should suffice in proving your general's valour. Also, it doesn't matter if you don't do it in every battle.


Cool. Now how do I erase his hooting?

And do changing faction heirs temporarily (to top up bodyguard) increase the probability of bad traits in those passed over?

[Ludens]

Cool. Now how do I erase his hooting?
I am afraid there is no in-game psychotherapist provided. He will stay mad, no matter what you do.


And do changing faction heirs temporarily (to top up bodyguard) increase the probability of bad traits in those passed over?
I am not quite sure, but I seem to recall that changing the inheritance might lead to resentfulness. However, the disinhereted trait gives -1 influence, so I wouldn't change faction heirs more often than necessary.

If you want to know more about traits, read Aesculapius' excellent treatise On the Feeding and Breeding of Governors and Generals (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=45969).

[Ciaran]

The general with the most stars lead the army can other generals in the same army earn stars and good traits as well? Basically I want to make sure all my generals get to stretch their legs once in a while.

Are good traits dependent upon the performance of the individual units led by gens or the final battle stats? Does it differ from the commanding and supporting generals?

There was an odd child who popped up with military genius 4 star skills but also had cowardly (-5% morale), hooting (wtf?) and advanced alopecia. How bad is -5% morale and hooting? Does 4 star skills overwhelmingly supercede the deficiencies?

As mentioned, only the commanding general gets v&s´s from a battle. Other generals can increase their bodyguards´ valour by actually doing some fighting, but nothing else.
The good traits depend, a general can gain the "good commander" trait line without actually doing any fighting himself, but if he does some killing himself he´s bound to get other battle-related traits as well.
And finally, the odd lunatic. I´ve got one as well, there´s not much you can do with them, in terms of making them governors or generals, but they´re a very handy (and free) heavy cavalry, especially early in the game. As long as you can´t get Triarii, the gerneral´s bodyguard is the most efficient unit to fight enemy cavalry (Equites just don´t pack the punch), but you don´t want to risk your general in such a fight, so a imbecile or two in the family aren´t completely useless. Mine has two silver chevrons at the moment, he´s a hell of a killer unit.

[Mooks]

I once got a military genius while I was the saxons, and made him my best general. Destroyed the Vandal, Roxolia and hun hordes. But after a while he devoleped traits like "Indeffrent attacker" , which I think is messed up, he attacked hordes numbering 3k in troops. Theres no reason he shouldve got that. After that he got a trait that limited his defense by 1, cant remember what it was called but he defended against 3 army of hordes and came out succesfull (Barely).

This is for BI. And also, why dont you get any cammand stars for defending bridges?

[Ludens]

This is for BI. And also, why dont you get any cammand stars for defending bridges?
Brigde battles are counted as ordinary field battles. As I understand it, BI is just far less generous with command stars.

[econ21]

I've noticed a disturbing tendency for "junior" generals to die in battles in both MTW and RTW. I suspect only the actual leading general gets the extra HP protection. Or maybe I am more reckless with the juniors?

But either way, I'm going to try to avoid using more than one general per stack in the future. It's hard to avoid in the early game though, as general units are extremely powerful at that stage.

[orangat]

I'm certain that all general units get 2xhitpoints. Then individual generals get plusses above that or it could be just the commanding general.

[econ21]

Yes, the lesser general's units get the 2HPs. It's the individual general I'm worried about (the escort seem to be phoenix guards or something, they get resurrected so easily).

[orangat]

No.


Killing a few routers should suffice in proving your general's valour. Also, it doesn't matter if you don't do it in every battle.

Looking at the traits file the conditions for coward+1 when general has not fought is:-
Condition not GeneralFoughtInCombat
and PercentageEnemyKilled = 0
and BattleOdds <= 1.2

So it looks like as long as 1% or more of the enemy is killed, everything is fine. The battleodds look mixed up and it should probably be >=1.2 instead.

[Romulas]

As your generals age put them in your army, use them as Heavy Calvary. They will be gone in a few years so get some use out of them. Cultivate your leaders and lead them to glory. Your paying for the lessor generals use them.